Abstract

The frictional dependence of the flipping rate of a linear rotor in a Maier–Saupe potential is evaluated from Langevin dynamics simulations. By assuming that the azimuthal angular velocity is rapidly thermalized, an approximate analytic expression for the rate is obtained within the framework of the Mel’nikov–Meshkov treatment of the Kramers turnover problem for one‐dimensional bistable potentials. The predictions of this expression are in good agreement with the accurate simulation results.